By Lefteris Moutis/ moutis@eurohoops.net
Juan Carlos Navarro and Sarunas Jasikevicius are the cornerstones of Barcelona in the series against Panathinaikos as the most talented and experienced players in the roster. “La Bomba” was excellent in all the games and Saras in two of them (first and third). But in both wins against the Greens, the Catalans needed an “X-factor” who could change the game from the perimeter. In the first match Viktor Sada played this role with his decisive baskets in the second half. And in the fourth one in OAKA the key player was Marcelinho Huertas. The Brazilian point guard was excellent and helped a lot with his all around game (10p., 6 reb. 6 assists).
Huertas talked on Eurohoops.net for his performance admiring that “it was just issue of confidence. During the previous games I was thinking too much and that was my mistake. In the fourth one I was shooting and taking decisions without thinking. That’s the way I must play from now on”.
Which was Barcelona’s secret in OAKA and which is the part of this game that the “Blaugrana” want to repeat in the fifth game? “We were really focused. We knew in the fourth game that the situation for us was “do or die”. We played zone defense in the whole game. Also, Diamantidis can’t take all the shots and the decisions in the game for his team, so we forced other players to do that. That worked great for us and we got the win. So in the fifth game, we have to play again very good in the defense. The zone worked perfectly against Panathinaikos in the second half of the third game and the whole fourth. We have of course to make some adjustments according to every single situation. I’m not the coach, so that’s what I can tell you about it”.
The home advantage will put pressure to Barcelona or will it help them? “Hopefully our fans will help us. We have been great so far in our home, we had only one tough loss against Panathinaikos, but now we’ll try to do our best”.